War's Meaningless Destruction

• Gemma Jain, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2019

19/05/1998
Dear diary
The sky is murky and grey, the moving clouds reminded me of the swift nature of our mortality. Whizzing through the sky and moving at a rapid speed, the warplanes shot above our heads. The rain was lashing heavy on us. The never-ending lightning bolts frighten us like knives attacking the sky as if they were determined to murder nature.

Every single aspect of our perspective was engulfed by gloominess that there was no peck of beauty that clung to us. As the last battalion fired up, the eerie sound of the devastating pain already filled me inside. BOOM! CRASH! As the bombs tremendously fell to the ground, the sight of people running for their lives into the enemy's grips still kills me to this day. I still remember the harsh sand which aggressively slapped our faces, as if it was laughing at us. It stung our eyes and it felt as if tiny needles were stabbing our back, preventing us to take a step forward. We listened intently to the commanding words, blocking our ears from unnecessary distractions. I felt like I was paralysed, I couldn't even blink, my legs were motionless feeling as if everything seemed to occur in slow motion. Whenever the trenches were poured with rain, the mud was so agonising when it slapped our raw bodies which were already in sore pain from the attacks.

POWER! WAR! MANIPULATION! DISASTER! Whenever I hear these words, it makes me shriek, my razor-like hair would lift off from my pale skin, the vicious torment all eating up the exaggerating meaning of life. I have seen despair from those timid eyes. Every night I dream of those merciless souls begging of cry to stop the terror that has devastated their everlasting life of happiness. Sick from the vulgar smell of rotten trenches which has infested within our fragile bodies, our bodies have shrunk to just our bones. Our hands, numb and frozen. We let ourselves die within our foe’s eyes. We have lost hope yet not given up. The overdosed and contaminated feeling of not washing up for days has really killed us.

I knew the war was the end of my friendship, my happiness, life's purpose and the start of hatred. Every morning I stared at the morning's horizon at heaven and prayed. The penetrating screams of other soldiers still hunted my mind. I always wondered, should I still be alive?

The red poppies took everyone's attention. It was the only piece of belonging we had from the past. From the last of who have remained, we are still star-struck, not wanting to think the memory of killing another soul. We weren't bad. We were forced by our country. If we didn't do it, who would? Who would die for this country?

My last wish is I hope the dead souls find peace, in a place where they belong and don't curse themselves for the country's loss. They don't deserve it.

Love
George